In a setback to plans to build the Obama Presidential Center on Chicago’s South Side lakefront, a federal judge ruled Tuesday that a lawsuit challenging its location can proceed. U.S. Judge John Robert Blakey said in a written ruling that the environmental group Protect Our Parks has enough legal...

Odds may still favor the eventual construction of former President Barack Obama’s $500 million museum and library in a public park along Chicago’s lakeshore, but it’s no longer a sure thing in the face of a formidable legal challenge by a parks advocacy group. U.S. District Judge John Robert Blakey...

The Obama Foundation secured million-dollar donations from five new donors in the last months of 2018, newly released contribution records show. But while in the past the foundation counted on wealthy individuals and families to support its budget, in the last quarter it relied mainly on other...

Former first lady Michelle Obama has added 21 new appearances to her international book tour to promote her memoir “Becoming,” officials announced Tuesday morning. Obama will kick off the second leg of her book tour in Tacoma, Wash., and will concentrate on visiting cities where she hasn’t yet...

Former President Barack Obama urged organizers and social innovators gathered at the Obama Foundation summit Monday evening to be patient in their pursuits of wide-scale community change. And in their moments of exhaustion, Obama said, they must remember that generations before them fought for...

Although she’s an internationally recognized pop star and actress, before she takes on any major project, Janelle Monae said she first asks herself if the work will further her mission of uplifting her community. “My grandmother … had 12 children and I have over 50 first cousins …” she said. “One...

A day after former first lady Michelle Obama appeared before a sold-out crowd at the United Center, the Obama Foundation announced that her husband would be in town for the organization’s second International Summit starting Sunday. Former President Barack Obama will be a highlighted guest and...

Donna Hammond can still vividly remember the moment she heard former first lady Michelle Obama acknowledge that while living in the White House she woke up every morning in “a house that was built by slaves.” For Hammond, the statement was evidence that Obama thoroughly understood the nation’s...

Photos

The Chicago City Council on Wednesday unanimously approved legislation that outlines how the Obama Foundation will be able to use the Obama Presidential Center once it is built in Jackson Park. Once constructed, the facility will be turned over to the city, which will own the buildings. The foundation...

The judge overseeing the federal lawsuit challenging the construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park said Wednesday he does not expect the case to drag on as both sides seek a quick answer on whether the facility can be built. “Lingering’s not gonna happen,” U.S. District Judge...

Paraisia Winston looks forward to having the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park, 4 miles from her South Shore home, to add a new historical treasure to her already culturally rich African-American community. She believes the center will spur investment and economic development in her South...

Drive along the weed-filled lots that line 63rd Street in Woodlawn and it’s hard to picture a bustling stretch of stores, apartments and commercial activity. That, though, is just what the city, which owns most of the land, and community leaders envision once the planned Obama Presidential Center...

Facing a court hearing Wednesday in a lawsuit that seeks to block the Obama Presidential Center from being built in Chicago’s Jackson Park, the center’s backers on Friday released closely guarded proposals from four universities that in 2014 were bidding to host the center. The winning proposal,...

The foundation representing basketball player Stephen Curry and his wife, author and television personality Ayesha Curry, recently donated between $10,000 to $100,000 to the Obama Foundation, the updated contributors report reveals. And for the first time, the National Association of Basketball...

A City Council committee took the first step Thursday toward approving legislation that outlines how the Obama Foundation can use Jackson Park and the Obama Presidential Center once it is built. And for the first time, the committee revealed language in the legislation that seeks to protect current...

First she preregistered on the website and then she got a text message with her secret code. On the morning that tickets for former first lady Michelle Obama’s book tour went on sale last Thursday, she logged in early so that she could be one of the first in line to make a purchase. “I knew it...

The Obama Foundation spent nearly $12 million on programming last year, including its star-studded international summit that brought leaders, elected officials and world-renowned activists to a two-day conference in the South Loop, newly released records show. The foundation also spent about $5...

Environmentalists suing the city of Chicago and the Chicago Park District to halt construction of the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park on Wednesday criticized a new agreement over use of the park, saying the revised terms were still not in the public interest. And although the proposed...

For the first time, the top brass of the Obama Foundation has responded to a lawsuit that is threatening to kill the Obama Presidential Center project. In an appearance before the Chicago Tribune Editorial Board on Tuesday, foundation officials took issue with a lawsuit filed by the environmental...

In an abrupt turn, the Chicago Park District and city of Chicago have decided to halt construction on a project that would relocate a track and field in Jackson Park, officials announced Monday. The action means that instead of moving the track and field farther south in the park to make room for...

Former President Barack Obama made a surprise appearance at his foundation’s South Side offices on Tuesday afternoon to discuss the future of his presidential center and, in part, to assure residents that although there have been delays, he is pressing forward with plans to build the facility. ...

As the federal review process needed for the construction of the Obama Presidential Center continues to be delayed, the Obama Foundation announced that it will host 37 of its scholars in Chicago this week. The foundation will bring the students enrolled as Obama Foundation Scholars at the University...

The Obama Foundation raised nearly $233 million mostly from private donors last year and spent about $1.5 million of that on local businesses including Chicago public relations, marketing and consulting firms, caterers, printers, contractors and other local businesses, according to its first annual...

The Chicago Park District has begun work to relocate a track and field in Jackson Park from its current location to a corner further south in order to make room for the Obama Presidential Center, officials said. And while the two projects are technically separate, the construction has sparked some...

When Charlotte Adelman was a student at the University of Chicago, the nearby parks became a refuge for her, a sprawling expanse of green where she could escape the concrete urban landscape. It was then, many decades ago, that Adelman began her journey to becoming a fighter for environmental justice....

The Obama Foundation has pushed back the groundbreaking date for the Obama Presidential Center after the federal review process was delayed for a second time this summer, officials confirmed Friday. Instead of starting construction later this year, the foundation is now saying they plan to break...

Oprah Winfrey is one of nine philanthropists to give more than $1 million toward construction of the Obama Presidential Center, officials said. She was joined by one of the wealthiest families from Boston and a foundation representing one of the country’s most prominent African-American billionaires...

Barbara and Jesse Steward moved into their ranch house in West Englewood 46 years ago. They raised three boys on their tree-lined block, which today boasts green lawns tended to by a community of mostly retirees. But the Stewards point to a glaring problem in their neighborhood — curbs. In some...

Months before they are set to break ground on the Obama Presidential Center, the Obama Foundation has appointed an agency and hired a staff member to ensure that the workers building the center are a reflection of the community it will sit in, officials said. Ernest R. Sawyer Enterprises Inc.,...

In her early days of living in the Cabrini Green public housing complex, the residents in her building picked up the trash and patrolled the elevators to make sure they kept their home clean and free from strangers, Delores Wilson said. The residents were all lower- or low-income, which brought...

When longtime Woodlawn resident Sharon Payne stood before the Chicago Plan Commission on Thursday to comment on plans for the Obama Presidential Center, she told them she was worried about the center’s impact on housing costs. She’s too old to move to another community, she said. She doesn’t want...

After more than seven hours of emotional and passionate testimony from hundreds of residents, community activists and elected officials, the Chicago Plan Commission voted overwhelmingly to approve the Obama Presidential Center on Thursday afternoon. The decision was a major hurdle for the Obama...

On a sunny Wednesday afternoon, there were no tourists walking through the doors of the Hyde Park Hair Salon, where Barack Obama regularly got his signature cut before he became president. Two regulars seated at the Obama table at Valois Restaurant were going about their business. And at the end...

Former President Barack Obama appeared on the South Side on Wednesday to greet his first class of Obama Foundation fellows. The gathering was held at the Stony Island Arts Bank, just steps from where the Obama Presidential Center is slated to be constructed. The meeting took place the day before...

They have collected thousands of digital postcards from residents expressing their excitement about placing the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park. They have hosted nine public meetings and hundreds of smaller sessions with residents and activists. They have distributed campaign-style placards...

A federal lawsuit filed by a Chicago nonprofit in an attempt to block the Obama Presidential Center from being built in Jackson Park accuses organizers of pulling an “institutional bait and switch” by shifting the center’s purpose away from being a true presidential library. Protect Our Parks Inc....

The Obama Foundation announced Tuesday that it has formally partnered with the city of Chicago and Chicago Public Library to place a new branch at the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park when it opens, officials said. But while officials have signed a letter of intent spelling out how they...

South Side activists who are pushing for a contract guaranteeing certain amenities when the Obama Presidential Center is built disrupted the Chicago Plan Commission meeting Thursday morning and were escorted out by security. Nearly two dozen residents were removed after they interrupted the proceedings...

More than a decade ago, while interning for a voting rights hotline, Tiana Epps-Johnson expected to field calls about voter intimidation or deceptive practices at voting precincts. Instead, she was flooded with more basic questions. “People were calling in asking things like: ‘How do I register?...

The Obama Foundation saw its largest donations so far this year come from repeat contributors who pledged to give even more money toward the organization’s vision, records show. The Crown Family, which owns a stake of the Chicago Bulls, real estate mogul and gay rights activist Mel Heifetz, and...

Archaeologists turned up remnants of the World’s Columbian Exposition of 1893, the fabled White City that drew millions of visitors to Chicago’s Jackson Park, as they scoured the site of the Obama Presidential Center and nearby parkland as part of the federal review of plans for the proposed complex....

When the Obama Presidential Center opens in about three years, visitors can get to it by car, Metra, bike or bus, but not by that most iconic form of Chicago transportation — the “L.” That’s because a Green Line branch that would have led right to the center was torn down in 1997, after some community...

If Jackson Park Highlands — the posh but tiny 16-square-block neighborhood of elegant, regal homes sitting at the foot of Jackson Park — is still a secret to most outside of the South Side, resident and businesswoman Alisa Starks said she doesn’t expect it to be for much longer. The glare of the...

A day after former President Barack Obama returned to Chicago and told hundreds at a public meeting that he wants his South Side center to help train the next generation of leaders, his foundation has announced a scholarship program to help students obtain master’s degrees. The Obama Foundation...

Former President Barack Obama came to Chicago on Tuesday to again make the case for building his presidential center in Jackson Park, telling hundreds of people gathered at McCormick Place that he believes his South Side complex will create more jobs, attract businesses and give more opportunities...

Proposed roadwork and underpass construction for the planned Obama Presidential Center will cost about $175 million, Chicago officials said Friday. It’s the first time the city has given an estimate of the public cost of the privately funded center. The proposed changes include widening portions...

When Keeana Barber’s guests arrive at her gala in the South Loop on Saturday night, hundreds of black entrepreneurs will be introduced to younger visionaries and hear their pitches for new businesses, one of which they will help fund. Then the group will raise a glass for accomplishing a feat that...

When Bronwyn Nichols Lodato began pushing to prevent a portion of Chicago’s Midway Plaisance from being developed into a parking garage by the Obama Foundation, she never expected to be criticized as anti-black. After all, she is an African-American woman who has lived in Hyde Park for more than...

An attempt by some African-American Chicago aldermen to publicly praise Obama Presidential Center designers for hiring minority contractors ran into shouts of “Shame on you!” by a group that wants a community benefits agreement to protect residents living near Jackson Park. The dueling news conferences...

During his White House years, Barack Obama did not shy away from big, provocative political issues. The aesthetic instincts of the former president, who once wanted to be an architect, are proving no different. Seven months after unveiling the design for his Obama Presidential Center, including...

Addressing criticism that their plans would undermine the serene landscape of historic Jackson Park, backers of the Obama Presidential Center on Tuesday revealed major revisions that include a sleeker version of the center’s controversial museum tower. The new tower design calls for a high-rise...

Bowing to community pressure, the Obama Foundation has scrapped its plan for an above-ground parking garage and will instead build an underground facility below the presidential center in Jackson Park, officials said late Monday. The garage will accommodate about 400 to 450 cars beneath the southern...

A collective of five construction firms — most of them owned by African-Americans — has been hired to manage the building of the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago. The decision came after four months during which foundation officials conducted interviews and probed the firms’ hiring records...

A revised design for the Obama Presidential Center’s controversial parking garage is getting a thumbs-down from some community leaders who attended a closed-door meeting at which the plan was unveiled. Like its predecessor, the new design calls for an aboveground two-story garage, concealed by...

The Chicago Park District on Thursday presented three unique proposals to redevelop Jackson Park and the South Shore Cultural Center as part of its South Lakefront Framework Plan. But while the vision of how the large swath of parkland on the South Side will eventually be updated over a decade...

Before the Obama Presidential Center can be built, the government will review the historic resources in Jackson Park and evaluate the project’s environmental effects, officials said at a Friday morning meeting to kick off the process. Any damages that the review highlights would have to be resolved...

Saying they want to draw more attention to their push for a contract guaranteeing jobs and amenities as the Obama Presidential Center is developed, dozens of South Side residents marched in Woodlawn and Hyde Park on Tuesday afternoon. Carrying colorful signs and chanting slogans, the residents...

Since last May, when former President Barack Obama unveiled conceptual plans for his Chicago presidential center, it has been extremely difficult to follow the progress of the design. The Obama Foundation, the nonprofit in charge of building the center, did not allow journalists access to the architects,...

The Obama Presidential Center will be a place where art, music and creativity are celebrated and public art will be made available for residents on the South Side, former first lady Michelle Obama said Wednesday. During her remarks at the Obama Foundation’s international summit at the Marriott...

They came from eastern Kentucky, Houston and Jakarta, Indonesia, from Bangladesh, Kenya and Mexico. More than 500 people, described as thought leaders and problem solvers who were hand-selected from thousands of applicants and nominees, gathered on the South Side on Tuesday to participate in the...

Cheryl L. Mainor vividly remembers the winter day in 2015 when she joined dozens of Chicagoans singing and dancing in a video, hoping to convince President Barack Obama to build his library and museum on the South Side. But now that the process of developing the presidential center campus is underway,...

Former President Barack Obama made a surprise appearance at his foundation’s first program initiative on the South Side on Saturday evening. Obama told the 175 youths gathered from around the city to participate in the Training Day program that he wanted to stop in and discuss how they could continue...

When the Obama Foundation rolls out its first major program, the organization won’t be welcoming diplomats, politically connected donors or celebrity elites. Instead, the first Training Day on Saturday will concentrate on young people from throughout the city, organizers with the foundation said....

The Obama Foundation will end its star-studded Summit to be held at the end of the month with a large community concert featuring Chance the Rapper and Gloria Estefan, officials announced Friday morning. The concert will bookend a two-day intensive workshop where community activists and civic leaders...

Two influential Chicago unions are joining South Side activists in their push to obtain a signed agreement guaranteeing local residents jobs and other benefits in the development of the Obama Presidential Center, officials announced Wednesday. Karen Lewis, head of the Chicago Teachers Union, and...

Once the Obama Presidential Center is constructed, it will have a children’s play garden, sledding hill, green spaces for picnics and outdoor gatherings, basketball courts and even a recording studio, officials have said. But what the space won’t have is all of former President Barack Obama’s manuscripts,...

Gov. Bruce Rauner said Thursday that it was “a wonderful honor” for Illinois to be selected as the home of the Obama Presidential Center, but raised doubts about whether the state could afford to kick in tax dollars to help pay for construction of the site on the South Side. The Republican governor’s...

Seven U.S. presidents and their spouses have been buried on the grounds of their libraries or museums, beginning with President Franklin D. Roosevelt. So as planning continues for former President Barack Obama's library and museum complex in Chicago's Jackson Park, the question is: Will he and...

As longtime Woodlawn resident Sharon Payne sat listening to former President Barack Obama explain why he didn't want to sign a contract promising certain jobs and benefits to South Side communities Thursday night, she could feel her stomach sink. It didn't matter what Obama was saying about the...

Developers of the Obama Presidential Center said they want to hire residents from the surrounding community, create long-term opportunities for people returning from prison and avoid displacing those who live closest to the Jackson Park site. But the Obama Foundation doesn't want to sign a legal...

A group of South Side activists and residents who live near the site of the planned Obama Presidential Center will camp out ahead of the Obama Foundation's first public meeting Thursday so they can be first in line. They hope their 24-hour demonstration draws attention to their push for a community...

Starting next month, the Obama Foundation will begin a series of one-day training sessions and also will host a summit aimed at promoting civic engagement among students and young adults, officials said Wednesday. In a video, former President Barack Obama said the programming, along with the creation...

It's only a 58-second video, but for Jahmal Cole, it was a chance to change some minds. So in the short clip now circulating on social media, Cole boasts about the long legacy of African-American homeownership, block clubs and neighborhood activism in Chatham — the South Side community he calls...

The Obama Foundation on Wednesday said it has selected four finalists to manage construction of the Obama Presidential Center and also laid out ambitious hiring goals for the firms. Community activists and residents have been pressuring the foundation to commit to a signed contract guaranteeing...

Hoping to ease concerns about plans to close Cornell Drive at the site of the proposed Obama Presidential Library, the Chicago Department of Transportation wants to add a lane to Lake Shore Drive near the site and two extra lanes to a portion of Stony Island Avenue, officials said on Wednesday....

Following four increasingly contentious community forums to discuss plans tied to the Obama Presidential Center, the Chicago Park District will host two more meetings in September to address neighbors' concerns. The Chicago Department of Transportation also will preview plans to close and redesign...

At a recent community forum to discuss plans for the Obama Presidential Center, Karin Droegemueller stepped up to the microphone and introduced herself as an "angry birder." She is among a flock of birders who fear that the proposed $30 million Tiger Woods golf course and expanded driving range...

Technology and energy corporations have joined the list of top donors to the Obama Foundation, which on Friday made public the names of more than 700 patrons from the last three months. Exelon and Microsoft have given more than a million dollars to the foundation, which was founded in 2014 but...

South Side community activists who want residents to see dividends from the Obama Presidential Center have begun drafting their wish list for community benefits agreements that seek new jobs, improved schools and affordable housing for nearby residents. They say a growing perception that community...

South Shore residents and park advocates are concerned that a nature area along Chicago's South Side lakefront could be partially displaced to make room for the new Tiger Woods golf course. The 4.27-acre South Shore Nature Sanctuary, created in 2002, is a respite from bustling city living. Located...

To make the proposed Obama Presidential Center a reality, the Chicago Department of Transportation and Obama Foundation made their case to neighbors Wednesday that roads must be closed and traffic must be rerouted. In addition to the already controversial proposal to close Cornell Drive, Rebekah...

Addressing neighbors' and park advocates' concerns that they would be left out of plans involving the addition of the Obama Presidential Center to Jackson Park, the Chicago Park District and city officials on Wednesday announced a series of meetings to discuss the future of the area. "The upcoming...

Fundraising for the Obama Foundation began to ramp up in 2016, with donations totaling more than $13 million, the most since it was founded in 2014, according to tax records released by the foundation on Monday. But that total is expected to surge as former President Barack Obama, now free of his...

From Boston's John F. Kennedy Library to Southern California's tribute to Ronald Reagan, America's 13 major presidential libraries get about $65 million a year from the federal government. That opens the facilities, which typically gloss over their namesakes' faults, to criticism that they are...

Barack and Michelle Obama on Wednesday offered the first look at the design of the planned Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park — a campus of three buildings highlighted by an eye-catching museum, whose height and splaying walls would make a bold architectural statement. Calling it a "transformational...

The New York firm that helped shape the recently opened National Museum of African American History and Culture will lead the exhibition design for the Obama Presidential Center's museum on Chicago's South Side, the Obama Foundation announced Tuesday. Ralph Appelbaum Associates will head a team...

Like his charismatic father before him, the Rev. Byron Brazier, pastor of the Apostolic Church of God in Woodlawn, knows how to pack the house and work the crowd. More than 400 people showed up in the church's banquet hall recently to talk about the prospect of a neighborhood renaissance — a painfully...

Former President Barack Obama on Wednesday paid a surprise visit to Chicago, meeting with several civic leaders to discuss his Presidential Center planned for Jackson Park, according to the Obama Foundation. The Rev. Richard Tolliver, pastor at St. Edmund's Episcopal Church, said he was at the...

The Obama Foundation, the not-for-profit developing the first African-American president's library and museum in Jackson Park, was criticized by a local alderman Monday for not sharing enough information on how South Side residents will benefit from the high-profile project. "My primary concern...

The Obama Foundation on Monday named a team of landscape architects for the Obama Presidential Center, to be led by the designer of Chicago's 606 trail and Maggie Daley Park. Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, based in New York, will head the team, which will include two Chicago landscape design...

The Obama Foundation is floating the idea of closing a major thoroughfare that connects Lake Shore Drive motorists to the South Side and a key route to Indiana and Michigan to create a pedestrian campus around its planned presidential library and museum in Jackson Park, according to several people...

Former President Barack Obama is wasting little time trying to establish his legacy through his foundation, rolling out a video appeal for his presidential library on a new website laden with biographical and historical detail — hours before Donald Trump was sworn in as president Friday. In a two-minute...

In the final fundraising report before President Barack Obama leaves office and begins to personally raise money for his library on the South Side, his foundation showed an uptick in donors. The report, which was released Friday and lists donors and a range of their donations for the fourth quarter...

The Obama Foundation tapped a White House veteran Monday to join the leadership team that will develop the presidential library on the South Side, naming David Simas as chief executive officer. Simas has served President Barack Obama in several capacities, most recently as assistant to the president...

Minority businesses will have a fair shot at contracts tied to the Obama Presidential Center that will be built on Chicago's South Side, the project's chairman told corporate and civic leaders Thursday. The recent formation of an "inclusion council" by the nonprofit foundation spearheading the...

Though President Barack Obama has three months left in office, some of the White House papers bound for his future library will leave the capital for Illinois beginning Oct. 26, officials said. Commercial trucks will be used to carry the material to a temporary storage facility in Hoffman Estates,...

At first glance, the meeting of about 100 South Side activists this month was unremarkable as they sat around folding tables and jotted down ideas for economic development on broad sheets of white paper. But the focus of the gathering was anything but. Over the next few years, the Obama Presidential...

After selecting architects and a site for the Obama Presidential Center, President Barack Obama faces another key decision: choosing a director for his library and museum. The job hasn't been advertised yet, but if recent practices hold a director could be in on the job by early next year. Alan...

No sooner had President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama chosen historic Jackson Park for his presidential library than neighboring Woodlawn began to dream big. Real estate developers see the project, to be built near the Museum of Science and Industry at a cost of at least $500 million,...

President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama won't be the first to build something on the future site of the Obama presidential library. A sizable portion of the Obama Presidential Center, as the library is officially known, is likely to rise on the same spot as one of the major exhibition...

The two South Side parks that vied to host Barack Obama's presidential library were anything but identical twins even though both were designed by the great landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted. Jackson Park, with its formal landscape fronting the Museum of Science and Industry and picturesque...

The Obama presidential library that appears headed for Chicago's Jackson Park is expected to give a boost to a pioneering nearby redevelopment project aimed at turning a blighted Woodlawn area around with stores and housing that will charge full market rents. "The library is a big deal, and I think...

Rejecting a rough-edged urban site for what could be a showcase near the lakefront, President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama have selected Chicago's historic Jackson Park as the site of his presidential library, sources said Wednesday. The choice, which leaked out ahead of a formal announcement...

The Obama Foundation, which is raising money for the presidential museum and library to be built on Chicago's South Side, posted its latest round of contributions on Friday. The foundation's donations are made public quarterly but only in broad dollar ranges so the total amount raised so far for...

A renowned husband-and-wife team of New York architects was named Thursday to design the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, with a unique challenge: Shape the first presidential library to be built in a predominantly African-American urban neighborhood sorely in need of an economic boost. Architects...

New York City architects Tod Williams and Billie Tsien, who on Thursday were named the architects of the Obama Presidential Center in Chicago, are highly regarded modernists who built their award-winning practice, as a profile of them once put it, "not on a signature style but on signature values."...

Washington Park residents view the proposed Obama library as one of their best prospects for an economic renaissance of their impoverished neighborhood. For 15 years, one of the busiest retail businesses in Washington Park has operated out of a converted U-Haul truck parked near the CTA Green Line...

Seated shoulder-to-shoulder with school kids just outside the freshly revamped Gerald R. Ford Presidential Museum, former Vice President Dick Cheney twirled a small U.S. flag in his hands one cool blustery morning this week as he waited to speak about the edifice honoring his first White House...

In the next few weeks, President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama are expected to make one of the most consequential decisions in Chicago's storied design history: They'll pick an architect for the Obama Presidential Center, the city's first presidential library. But just how that process...

Before the doors of President Barack Obama's library open on Chicago's South Side, truckloads of White House archives will be shipped to a former furniture store in the northwest suburbs. A massive volume of paperwork, electronic data and artifacts will find a temporary home at the old Plunkett...

The foundation building the Obama Presidential Center on the South Side emailed supporters Monday to introduce some of its staff members and stress that its mission goes beyond bricks and mortar. Among the staff members mentioned in the email from the Obama Foundation is Roark Frankel, director...

A federal agency could move into an old furniture store in Hoffman Estates in October to start processing records and artifacts from the Obama White House, officials said Friday. The building, at 2500 W. Golf Road, housed a Plunkett Homes Furnishings store until it closed in 2009 during the Great...

Six wealthy donors and foundations gave a total of $1.84 million last year to the nonprofit Barack Obama Foundation, which is preparing to build his presidential center on Chicago's South Side. The Gill Foundation of Colorado gave $347,000, followed by the Sacks Family Foundation of Illinois, at...

The competition to design the Barack Obama Presidential Center in Chicago is moving closer to the finish line, with architects presenting conceptual plans for the prestigious project directly to President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama, according to people familiar with the process. In addition,...

If Woodlawn is chosen as the site for the Obama Presidential Center, a South Side megachurch, a nonprofit development organization and the city could suddenly find themselves holding some of the most valuable land on the South Side. While President Barack Obama still is weighing whether to build...